


The Weight of the World

by mollswinchester



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Domestic, Domestic Castiel/Dean Winchester, Domestic Fluff, Established Castiel/Dean Winchester, F/F, Fluff, Found Family, Kid Fic, M/M, POV Outsider, POV Sam Winchester, Parent Castiel (Supernatural), Parent Dean Winchester, Reunions, Step-Parent Dean Winchester, Thanksgiving
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-11-26
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:07:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27721874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mollswinchester/pseuds/mollswinchester
Summary: After years of not seeing his brother, Sam shows up on his doorstep in hopes that he won't have to spend Thanksgiving alone. Nobody is more surprised than him to see the person Dean has become.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Dorothy Baum/Charlie Bradbury, Jessica Moore/Sam Winchester, mentioned
Comments: 43
Kudos: 498





	The Weight of the World

**Author's Note:**

> Let Dean Winchester be happy 2020. 
> 
> Haha no but seriously I am in need of domestic so here take this and do with it what you will.

The little blue house on the corner of the street looks intimidating from where Sam stands on the sidewalk. Scary mysterious, something he has absolutely no idea how to face. He shakes his hands, flailing his wrists from side to side as if it will somehow make the rest of him stop trembling with nerves. In his entire twenty-four years of life, Sam has never encountered as much pain and grief as he has in the last few weeks. He knows he’s entitled to feel the way he does, but it doesn’t stop him from thinking he should be able to pull himself together. 

A little over a month ago, Sam came home to find a postcard sitting on his counter, buried beneath a pile of bills. It was addressed to his old apartment, the one he’d shared with three other guys his sophomore year. Despite having moved twice since living there, the card somehow found its way to him, thanks to the forwarding addresses he’d left with each apartment before he left. 

There’s a picture of the Chicago skyline on the postcard along with the words “Greetings from ILLINOIS” in big block letters. On the back, there isn’t even a note. Just an address. No signature, but Sam recognizes his brother’s handwriting from the countless times he’d helped Sam with his homework when they were kids. 

It isn’t that Sam ignored the card. He’d more or less just forgotten about it. Or maybe he wanted to pretend it hadn’t shown up in the first place. It’s been years since Sam has spoken to his brother, even longer since they’ve actually seen each other. At some point, they just stopped making an effort.

But then, on Sunday, Sam drank himself stupid and booked a one-way ticket for a flight to Bloomington, Illinois because that was the only thing he could think of that might make sense. When he woke up the next day, having completely forgotten the purchase, he got a confirmation text. Rather than cancelling it and getting his money back while he still could, he threw a bunch of shit into a suitcase and decided to go for it. 

Now he’s here, holding the postcard in his hands, checking it again and again to make sure he has the right address. He isn’t sure how he’s going to work up the courage to actually go and knock on the door when he’d spent about an hour in the airport bathroom convinced he was going to throw up from anxiety. He should have rented a car. That would have given him a chance to get away if things went badly or, more likely, if he chickened out. Instead he’d gotten a cab and paid way too much for a ride all the way to Pontiac. A cab that’s long gone now. 

And maybe it was dumb of him to assume Dean would welcome him with open arms on Thanksgiving, of all days. He could have sent a letter in the mail, or dug around until he found a phone number. Anything would have been smarter than this. 

Ultimately, Sam is persuaded to knock when an elderly woman walking her dog across the street starts giving him suspicious looks. He worries that she’s a moment away from going back to her house and calling the police to report him for loitering, so he grabs his bag, hauls it to the front door, and, before he can back out, knocks. 

It’s over a minute before anyone answers. He counts. Inside, there’s loud music and the occasional voices that stop once he raps his fist against the door. He’s about to knock again, or turn back toward the sidewalk and run, when the doorknob starts to turn. Sam’s stomach turns to goo as the door swings open and he braces himself for whatever his brother might do. 

But it’s not Dean who opens the door. It’s a dark-haired, tired looking man with a lean, muscular frame. He’s wearing a pair of flannel pajama bottoms and a too-big AC/DC t-shirt that’s so worn at the collar, it dips down past his collarbones. 

“Can I help you?” the man asks. He’s squinting and tilting his head like Sam is somehow the strangest thing he’s ever seen. It’s not exactly unfriendly, but Sam gets the feeling the man would rather not have been interrupted from whatever he was doing. 

“I don’t–” Sam starts, but he shakes his head and starts again. “Um, I’m looking for Dean.” The man’s face stays expressionless, so Sam clears his throat. “Dean Winchester.”

“Why?”

Sam raises the postcard that he’s still holding in his hand. “He, uh, he sent me this address. I assumed he lived here.”

“Cas?” A voice calls from inside of the house. Immediately, Sam recognizes it as Dean’s. “Who’s at the door?”

The man before him, Cas, stares at Sam for a few more beats before his eyes begin to widen as if he’s piecing together a puzzle. “Wait here,” he tells Sam, and the door is closed in his face. 

So Sam waits, and he tries to prepare himself for something to say if Dean is the next one to come to the door. Will he send Sam away? Or sock him in the jaw? Or just slam the door in his face? He’s left for a few minutes, imagining and stressing all of the possible scenarios when the door finally opens back up and he’s face to face with Dean for the first time in years. 

In the end, it’s about as anticlimactic as it can get. 

Dean is wearing pajamas as well, and his hair is sticking in every direction. He leans against the doorframe and crosses his arms over his chest. “I take it you got the postcard,” he says. 

Sam tries to read Dean’s face. It isn’t blank, there’s something there in the way his lips are pursed and eyebrows furrowed, but Sam can’t figure it out. It’s a testament to how long they’ve been apart. 

“Uh,” he says. “Yeah. Yeah, I got it.”

“And you waited until Thanksgiving to show up? Instead of, I don’t know, sending a letter?” Sam shrugs, entirely at a loss for words. Dean’s gaze drops to the bag by Sam’s feet, a duffel he’s kept from their time on the road as kids. “You planning to stay?” His face remains unreadable. 

“Huh? Oh, no. I mean, I’m not presuming anything. I just, you know, haven’t checked into a hotel yet.”

Dean sighs, running a hand down from his face, and then he finally starts to smile. It’s small, barely there, but it’s something. “All the hotels are probably booked. You can stay here.” That’s all Sam needs to hear before he’s wrapping his arms around Dean. Dean huffs and pats Sam on the back and whatever this is, whatever this becomes, Sam decides it’s good enough. 

“I’ve missed you, man,” Sam says. 

Dean nods. “Yeah, me too.”

“I’m glad you sent this,” he says, flicking the postcard that’s still in his hand. 

“So am I." Dean rubs and the back of his neck and glances behind him. “Look, Sam, I’m, um—” But Dean doesn’t have to say anything, because Sam looks down to where his brother’s hands are fidgeting and sees him twisting a ring on his finger. It’s gold and not the one of Dad’s that Dean used to wear. 

“Is that—are you married?” Sam asks, not bothering to mask the surprise that’s most definitely showing on his face. 

“Yeah,” Dean says. He glances down at the ring once and then back to Sam. “I have a husband.

Sam, still processing the band on his brother’s finger, is overwhelmed with anger that he didn’t know, shame that he didn’t think to call Dean and talk, and surprise that his brother managed to settle down. At first, he doesn’t even really register what Dean said. When it sinks in, he all but gasps. “A husband? You—You’re married to a man?”

“Yeah,” Dean breathes, the ghost of a smile on his lips. “That’s what husband means.”

“Wait, the guy who answered the door?”

“Cas.”

“And he’s your—”

“Husband.”

“Wow.”

“That okay?” Dean asks, though he doesn’t sound all that concerned. Perhaps he knows Sam won’t mind, but it’s probably that he knows Sam isn’t worth it if he does. 

“What? Oh, yeah, that—wow. Just surprising, is all. Like, really surprising.” He clears his throat. “I’m happy for you.”

They’re interrupted by an ear-piercing wail from somewhere inside of the house. Instead of showing concern, Dean sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Grab your bag. You can meet your nephew.”

Sam nearly falls to the floor on principle. “N-nephew?” he sputters. Dean ignores him in favor of retreating back into the house, leaving his brother blithering on the porch. 

When he finally realizes that he’s just been staring into the house for too long, he grabs his bag and hurries inside. The entryway of the house consists of a staircase that leads to another floor and a coat rack in the corner. Sam sets his bag beside it in favor of lugging it around. To the left, there’s a living room and the right holds an office. Straight ahead, past the stairs, is a kitchen. 

He hears quiet sobs and hushed voices as he approaches the kitchen. Once there, he sees Dean holding a small boy, probably three at the oldest, on his hip. The boy is sniffling into Dean’s shoulder while Cas, Dean’s husband, is wiping down his forehead with a towel. There’s a mess of food on the floor and at the kitchen counter, as well as on both Cas and the boy. 

“Come here, little bee,” Cas is saying to the boy, pulling him from Dean’s arms. He goes easy, turning his head so it’s now pressed into Cas’s shoulder. “Let’s go watch some cartoons.” Cas carries the boy out of the room and Dean watches until they’re both out of sight.

Sam stares open-mouthed and the pure domesticity of Dean’s life. Dean, married with a son in a small, midwestern town. With a husband. 

Dean, noticing Sam’s staring, shrugs sheepishly. “Help me wipe this down,” he says, as if the whole situation isn’t, in fact, as bizarre as it is. He tosses Sam a wet rag and grabs another one for himself. 

“Is, uh, is everything okay?” Sam asks, crouching down to wipe the floor that is now sticky from spilled juice. 

Dean takes to wiping the counter. “Jack decided he didn’t like his yogurt today,” he says. “Cas got him to eat it, but not before a tantrum, it looks like.”

Sam’s quiet for a minute, trying to think of absolutely anything he could say that Dean won’t take offense to. “So you have a kid,” he decides. “A whole kid.”

“We have another on the way.” Sam raises his eyebrows, pleading with Dean to elaborate without him having to outright ask. Dean gets a faint smile on his face. He probably doesn’t even know he’s doing it. “We found a surrogate. She’s pregnant. The baby should be here in January.”

Sam can’t help the laugh that escapes his mouth. “This is great, Dean. I mean, seeing you like this, it’s—I’m happy for you.” Dean snorts a little, but he doesn’t deflect. He just keeps smiling. 

They finish cleaning in silence. Dean pauses at the sink for a moment. “Okay, I think everyone’s stopped crying, now. You wanna meet them?”

Sam nods eagerly. 

Dean leads him to the living room. There are toys scattered on the floor and various pieces of furniture. Cas and Jack are sitting side by side on the couch, both equally invested in the cartoon on the television. 

“Babe,” Dean says to get Cas’s attention. Cas looks back at the two of them and pushes himself up from the couch. He walks behind the couch until the three of them are close enough that they can talk quietly without distracting Jack from his show. 

Dean clears his throat. “Uh, so, Cas, this is Sam. Sam, this is Cas.”

Cas reaches forward for Sam’s hand and shakes it. “It’s nice to meet you, Sam.” He doesn’t seem all that eager to be meeting him, which leads Sam to think he’s developed some less than positive opinion of him, and they’re probably completely valid. 

“Yeah, you too, man.”

Cas stares at him for a moment, but ultimately turns away when Jack traipses over and loops an arm around Cas’s knee. He looks up at Sam, craning his neck to do so, and blinks his curious eyes. 

“Jack,” Dean says, bending his knees to level himself with the kid. “This is your uncle Sam.”

Jack doesn’t say anything, just tilts his head and raises his arms. 

“He wants you to pick him up,” Cas says. Sam, mildly horrified, obliges. He reaches down and hooks his hands under Jack’s armpits, lifting him up. Jack wraps his legs around Sam’s waist and links his arms around Sam’s neck. 

“Sammy,” he coos with a toothy grin, patting Sam’s jaw with his hand. Sam laughs and bounces up and down, making Jack giggle. 

It’s only about a minute more before the theme song to another cartoon starts playing on the television and Jack squirms out of Sam’s arms to go watch. 

When Sam looks back to his brother, he sees Dean watching Jack with fond eyes as he dances to the music. Cas, on the other hand, is watching Dean with the same kind of look.

“He’s cute,” Sam observes.

“Damn right,” Dean says, earning himself a soft smack on the chest from Cas. “Sorry. Darn right,” he corrects, rolling his eyes. 

“Are you staying for Thanksgiving dinner?” Cas asks. 

“Oh, no, I figured I could just go find a hotel. To be honest, I forgot it was Thanksgiving when I decided to come.”

“What are you talking about, man? I already told you you could stay.”

“I wouldn’t want to—”

"Sam, really, we’d love it if you stayed.” Cas still doesn’t smile, but he looks genuine enough.

“Oh,” says Sam. “Yeah, okay then. Thank you.”

“Of course that means you’ll have to help us get ready for the meal. We have some friends coming over.” Cas begins walking to the kitchen. “It really is convenient that you showed up so early. Dean refuses to shove his hand in the turkey, so—” Cas motions for Sam to follow him into the kitchen. 

Sam looks back to Dean, a bit fearful, and earns himself a grin and a nonchalant shrug in return. 

—- 

Cas stays true to his word and puts Sam to work. Sam peels potatoes, mashes cranberries, and yes, at one point he even finds himself elbow deep in a turkey. He cleans the living room, dusts the dining room, which is apparently never used, and helps Jack pick up his toys. He doesn’t mind, especially if it’s just the penance he has to pay before Cas stops looking at him the way he has been. 

Surprisingly, he has a good time. Dean turns on some music from a speaker above the fridge and Sam is actually relieved to learn that Dean is still playing his mullet rock, no matter how different he may seem. 

The kitchen is chaotic. There’s food everywhere and three tall, grown men skirting around one another. Sam loves it, and he finds himself laughing more than he has in a long time. 

They take a few breaks, once for snacks and once when Led Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll” plays over the speaker and Jack makes everyone stop to dance. Sam nearly faints at the sight of his brother holding a three-year-old on his shoulders, dancing around the kitchen with a husband who’s trying to be stern but still smiling despite himself. Sam snaps a picture with his phone. He has no idea who he’ll show, but he isn’t sure he’ll get the opportunity to see it again. 

When they’re finally finished with all of the things on Cas’s list, Jack falls over onto the couch to take a nap and Dean goes to shovel the driveway of the snow from last night. 

Cas is wiping down the mess in the kitchen so Sam decides to lend him a hand. He takes a washcloth from the sink and runs the faucet over it, then begins to scrub the countertops. 

“Thank you,” Cas tells him. 

Sam nods at him in return. The music was turned off a few minutes before so that everyone could calm down, leaving the house much quieter than before. 

“You know, when I met Dean, he thought emotions were things to be ignored. Drowned in beer. He’s better, but he still struggles with sharing his feelings. But he’s thrilled you’re here. I can tell.” Cas isn’t looking at him, but Sam stops wiping the counter and watches him talk. “He’s been so nervous ever since he sent that postcard. He didn’t think you’d want to get in touch with him.”

“Really?” Sam asks. 

“Really,” Cas says. “What made you decide to come?”

“Oh,” Sam says. He hadn’t really considered that himself, seeing as he was drunk when he bought the ticket. “I, uh, I’ve had a rough go of it lately. To be honest, I was tired of being alone. I think I just wanted my family.”

Cas hums in response but doesn’t say anything else, for which Sam is grateful. Any more conversation like this might prompt him to break down on the spot and that’s probably not the best way to impress his newfound brother-in-law. 

\---

At around two in the afternoon, Jack announces that the first guest has arrived by shouting from where he’s been perched by the window for the better part of thirty minutes. 

It’s not long before the front door swings open without a knock and two women stroll in. One has bright red hair. She’s smiling and carrying a massive crockpot. The woman beside her is holding a pie in each hand. 

“Happy Thanksgiving, Bitches!” The redhead says, pushing into the kitchen so she can put down the crockpot. “Someone come help me find a place for this.” Dean takes it from her and puts it on the counter while Cas hurries up to the other woman and takes the pies. 

Jack skips into the kitchen behind everyone and Sam follows, more nervous about meeting new people than what is probably acceptable. 

Sam wasn’t expecting anything like this. He’d imagined Dean living in a small, shabby apartment at most. Maybe he would have a few friends, or even a job, but this? An entire life—a world Sam isn’t a part of… it hurts just as much as it makes him happy. 

Everyone in the kitchen is hugging each other. The redhead kisses Dean on the cheek and engulfs Cas in a bear hug. Then she lifts Jack off the ground and swings him around, prompting him to fall into a fit of giggles. 

The excitement fizzles out eventually and the two women finally notice Sam. “Who’s this?” the redhead asks. 

Dean’s grin only grows. “This is my brother Sammy. Sammy, this is Charlie,” he points to the woman with red hair, “and Dorothy, her girlfriend.”

Charlie’s head whips around so fast to face Sam, he’s half surprised her neck doesn’t crack. She gasps, loudly, and beams. “Sam!” she shouts. With that, she hurries toward him and pulls him into a hug similar to the one she gave Cas. “I’ve heard so much about you,” she says. Then she looks at Dorothy, arms still wrapped around Sam.. “I can’t believe I’m finally meeting the famous Sam Winchester,” she whispers, loud enough for everyone in the room to hear. 

Sam hugs her back, albeit not as enthusiastically, but he laughs into her shoulder. “It’s nice to meet you too,” he tells her. 

“Charlie works with Cas,” Dean says. Sam nods, realizing he doesn’t know what Cas’s job is. Or Dean’s, for that matter. 

“I’m no hot-shot professor, though,” Charlie says. “Just a tech nerd.”

Dorothy laughs. “You’re right about the nerd part.” Charlie rolls her eyes and kisses her on the cheek. 

The doorbell rings and Jack is immediately rushing out of the room. Cas follows behind him, no doubt to make sure Jack doesn’t open the door for a stranger. There’s some muffled conversation, and then three more people come into the kitchen. Dean introduces them as Benny and Andrea and their daughter Celia, who’s around Jack’s age. 

After that, someone new is at the door nearly every five minutes.  
There’s Cas’s brother Gabe who winked when Sam introduced himself. There’s Donna and Jody who are accompanied by two younger girls, Claire and Alex. Cas’s British friend Balthazar comes holding two bottles of black-label Johnnie Walker. The last group of people to arrive consist of a guy named Garth with big ears and a frail body, his wife Bess, and a set of triplets that can’t be more than a year old. 

When Sam had helped Dean set up the extra folding table at the end of the regular dining room table, he hadn’t expected it to be entirely full. He hadn’t expected his brother to have a real, honest to god life. 

Sam hadn’t expected to ever see Dean again. 

Sam sits between Jack and Charlie while they eat. Across from him is Gabe, who tries to play footsie all throughout dinner. These people are loud and most of them drink a lot and make crass jokes, but Sam finds himself laughing harder than he has in a long time because of them. They treat him like he’s supposed to be there, and he’s starting to think maybe he is. 

Sam offers to start on the dishes after dinner for something to do and Charlie offers to join him. They stand side by side at the sink. Sam washes and Charlie dries and puts away since she knows the kitchen better than Sam. 

“Dean talks about you all the time,” Charlie says. Sam snorts. “I’m serious. He practically introduced himself to me by saying, ‘Hi, I’m Dean. I’m an aquarius, I enjoy long walks on the beach and frisky women, and my brother Sam got a full-ride scholarship to Stanford.’”

“I don’t believe you,” Sam says honestly. 

“He might not have used those words, but I knew how proud of you he was the day I met him.” She puts a bowl in the cupboard and turns to face Sam. “You might not be able to tell, but you being here made his day.”

\---

Hours later, when everyone has left and Jack has been put to sleep, Sam finds himself sitting on the couch and twiddling his thumbs. Cas is in the recliner grading papers. A pair of glasses are perched on his nose and the lamp beside the chair is lit. The last time Sam saw Dean, he was lying in bed with Jack as he fell asleep.

“You mind if I get some fresh air?” Sam asks. Cas looks up from the stack of papers in his lap and nods. He motions behind him to the dining room where there’s a sliding glass door. Sam gets up from the couch and walks over to it, sliding it open and stepping outside. It’s chilly but it’s warmed up since the morning, melting all of the snow. There’s a fair amount of toys scattered around the backyard, a grill, and a nice wrap-around porch. Sam sits down on the top step. 

Back when he and Dean were kids, Sam idolized him. He wanted to be just like his big brother. Then Sam went away to college and thought that had all changed. He thought he could finally make a life for himself, away from his family and the way he felt like they tethered him to the ground. 

But now he’s here, and Sam realizes this is what he wants. A family of his own, friends who will love him and his family, people to spend holidays with in absolute chaos. What he wants most, is his brother. 

When he was a kid, Sam hadn’t even considered the possibility that he might go so long without seeing his brother. Even when he was at Stanford, he figured that they’d been through so much together, there was no choice but to keep in touch. He figured Dean would put in an effort. But in the end, Sam stormed out and didn’t look back. And Dean didn’t fight him. 

He’s pulled from his thoughts when a cold bottle taps his shoulder. Sam looks up and sees Dean taking a swig of a beer and offering one to Sam. “Mind if I sit?” 

Sam shrugs and scoots over to make room. They sit in silence for god knows how long. The night is getting colder and Sam is beginning to wish he’d brought a jacket, but he doesn’t plan on getting up from his position beside Dean. 

“Why did you come?” Dean asks. 

It’s virtually the same question Cas asked earlier, so the words “I didn’t want to be alone,” come easily. 

“Alone? What, no fancy lawyer friends? You got nobody?” Dean looks appalled. Sam wishes he didn’t feel so close to crying, but for the past few weeks, it really hasn’t been hard to evoke this response from him. 

“No, I have friends,” he says, thinking of Kevin and Becky and Zacg, “My girlfriend, though,” he starts, “she died. ‘Bout a month ago.”

Dean pulls his beer away from his mouth. “Shit, Sammy,” he says. “I’m sorry. What was her name?”

“Jess,” Sam tells him. “Met her sophomore year.” They’d been talking about getting married. Sam was so ready to have kids and grow old with her. He was ready to commit his life to her after their first date.

Dean’s quiet for a long time before he puts an arm around Sam’s shoulders. Sam leans into him, feeling like he’s a toddler again, going to Dean for comfort after a nightmare. “You can stay here as long as you need, Sammy. And you can come back any time. I mean it. We don’t mind.” Sam smiles to himself. 

“You have a family, Dean.”

“Yeah, you’re part of that, man.”

Sam sits up and clears his throat. “Speaking of your family,” he says, “you have a husband?”

It’s dark, but Sam can still see the tips of Dean’s ears go pink. “Right, I guess I kept that secret pretty well, huh?”

Sam snorts in agreement. “So how’d you and Cas meet?”

“Cas knows shit about cars, so one day he brought his piece of crap continental into the shop I was working at. Turned out the engine was about ten miles from catching fire, so it’s a good thing he finally decided to get it taken care of.”

“When did you get married?”

“Bout a year after we met. Just went to the courthouse and signed the papers.” He pauses. “Jack is Cas’s son. I mean, he’s mine, but Cas and his girlfriend had him before we met. She died in labor.”

Maybe he and Cas actually do have a little in common. “Oh,” Sam says, because what else can he say? 

“We met a little while later. Started as friends, became more. Soon as we got married, we started the papers for me to legally adopt Jack.” Sam remembers Dean mentioning having a second kid earlier and he smiles at the thought. 

“And now you’re here?”

“Now we’re here. You know, I never pictured myself as a father. I don’t know, maybe I always wanted it, but I just didn’t think it was in the cards for me. But I wouldn’t change it for the world.”

“You got soft,” Sam says matter-of-factly. 

Dean frowns and elbows Sam in the side. “No I didn’t,” he says. Sam laughs. 

“You know, I don’t think Cas likes me very much.”

“He’s protective, that’s all. He’s been burned by family too much to trust just anyone. But you guys’ll warm up to each other.”

It’s quiet again when the door behind him opens and Sam looks back to see Cas. 

“Hey,” he says, voice softer than Sam is used to, getting Dean’s attention. “I’m going to bed.”

Dean pushes himself up. “I’ll join you in a bit,” he says. He snakes his arms around Cas’s midsection. Sam tries to look away, but watching Dean like this, happy, it’s surreal. 

“Okay,” Cas says, putting a hand on Dean’s cheek and kissing him. Sam does look away now, because no matter how happy he is for Dean, he’s still his brother. “Goodnight, Sam,” Cas says. “I’m sure we’ll be able to get to know each other better tomorrow.”

“Night, Cas.”

As Cas turns to walk away, Dean slaps his ass and Sam rolls his eyes. So does Cas. “Night, babe,” Dean says. 

“You can sleep on the pull out couch,” Dean says when it’s just the two of them again. “It’s pretty comfortable, if I do say so myself.”

“You sleep there a lot then?”

“Only when I piss cas off,” Dean says, and he doesn’t look the least bit ashamed of himself. 

“Okay, good enough,” Sam says. 

“I’ll go grab some sheets and pillows,” Dean says once they’ve made it back to the living room. He leaves and Sam starts working on removing the couch cushions. 

He’d noticed earlier that the house is cluttered in photographs, but he hadn’t seen the one on the table beside the couch until now. It’s one of the few pictures that survived the fire back in Lawrence, only it’s blown up so it’s big enough to fit a frame. Sam, Dean, and their parents are standing in front of a tree outside of their house, smiling at the camera. 

Dean brings him the sheets and Sam makes himself a bed. He doesn’t bother checking his phone before going to sleep, knowing that there’s no one he needs to keep in touch with. 

When he finally falls asleep, it’s to the faint sound of Dean yelling at his husband for snoring in their bedroom upstairs. 

\---

The weight of the world  
is love.  
Under the burden  
of solitude,  
under the burden  
of dissatisfaction

the weight,  
the weight we carry  
is love.

"Song" Allen Ginsberg.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Allen Ginsberg's "Song" 
> 
> Hope you are all doing well in these trying times (political madness, global pandemic, holiday season, the CW/SPN mess, personal life situations, etc.)!!!
> 
> come yell at me on the Tumblr! https://molls-winchester.tumblr.com


End file.
